Groupon ‘not in a hurry’ to find next CEO

After firing its chief executive and founder in February, Groupon says it is not rushing to find someone to permanently fill his shoes.

“The leadership team is very, very strong and is jelling very nicely,” said Ted Leonsis, the co-interim CEO at Groupon, in today’s earnings call. “We’re not in a hurry.”

Leonsis and executive chairman Eric Lefkofsky are sharing the CEO role after ousting Andrew Mason a day after its last quarterly earnings report. Even when the company met earnings expectations, shares would drop because the profit simply wasn’t there. Indeed, during the earnings call that would result in Mason’s kick out the door, shares plummeted 28 percent despite coming in right around where analysts expected at $638 million in revenue.

This quarter the company made $601.4 million in revenue, beating expectations. This revenue also represents an 8 percent increase compared with the same quarter in 2012. With Mason gone, and a new plan to unify the backend systems between its North American and international operations, stock went up 10 percent in after hours.

It’s no wonder the company is happy to stay where it is. But Leonsis assures investors it has formed a committee to find the new CEO and the search is currently under way. Groupon otherwise had a loss of $0.01 per share and a gross profit of $379 million. Groupon has $1.2 billion in overall cash and “cash equivalents.”